Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Lance is rich but Phil Knight is richer...

Let's follow the money and see who should be on the stand and who should get a pay raise. Lance is worth 125 million dollars, Roger Clemens is worth 60 million dollars, Secretariat was worth 3 million dollars, Phil Knight is worth 14.7 billion dollars, Hal Steinbrenner (Georges son) is worth 4 billion dollars. In my book, Lance, Roger and Secretariat are entitled so some serious back pay for all the swag they sold for companies over the years. After all they were the ones that had to do all the work and sacrifice their bodies, lives, and well being while training and using performance enhancing drugs.

How many tickets did the freaking Steinbrenners sell to folks over the years so we could see the one and only Roger Clemens while he was lubed to the gills? George Steinbrenner's attention to detail was legendary and his own managers called him 'Manager George'. If you think for a minute that George's inner circle did not know about the Clemens dope factor than maybe you also believe that Johan Bruyneel has never seen a blood transfusion. The Steinbrenners would never go in front of a congressional hearing because they own a few of them for crying out loud.

Why are we putting the race horses on the stand? When money was absolutely flowing into the offices of Phil Knight (nike) and John Burkes (trek), do you think that they were concerned as to how Lance was winning? These multi billion dollar companies don't just throw millions at an athlete without doing their homework. Before they sign on the dotted line, they have teams of people who ensure they know everything about their athletes including: trainers, coaches, friends, heart rates, blood types, life insurance policies, financial history, credit, weakness, family, strengths, and last but not least their dreams. The corporations fed on those dreams to the tune of billions (1,000,000,000). Nike decided to donate to cancer research on July 27th 1999 (Lance's first TdF win). Lance did not chose his story (single mom, world title, the cancer, the comeback) it just happened and savvy money makers quickly identified it as a sure thing.

What I can't figure out is why did Clemens take the stand. I would have pleaded the 5th and demanded that my partners in crime join me (Steinbrenners, addidas, MLB, ect...). When the athletes get tuned up with banned substances they are with a team of specialists, but when they get busted they are all by their lonesome. I am not advocating drugs, I am just pointing out the fact that the corporations have absolutely nothing to loose and everything to gain with a sponsored athlete who happens to be bigger stronger faster leaner. If I was Lance, I would be pointing our the fact that lots of folks got rich while ensuring they got "their" 7 TdF wins. After seeing what the fat cats are pulling down working with a legal safety net, I think Lance is grossly underpaid because he has to pay for his legal safety net and I am sure it is not cheap. If they want the sport to be clean, then they simply need to change the rules and go after the folks pocket books who are manipulating the drugged puppets.

Can you spy the common theme here?

Speaking of race horses - do you think that Marion was getting good advise? When she got busted, her people had her back - her way back, and she was left to fend for herself.

For the record: drugs do not make mediocre athletes into superstars, they help world class athletes go 5% faster.